Brandon Stadium

Brandon Stadium

Brandon Stadium also known as Coventry Stadium, is located 6 miles east of Coventry in Brandon, Warwickshire, England. It is the home of the Coventry Bees motorcycle speedway team. It also hosts BriSCA F1 Stock Car Racing on the 1st Saturday of the month from April through to November. Since 1978 it has also hosted Greyhound racing, known as Coventry Greyhounds.

Brandon Stadium's first speedway meeting took place on 29 September 1928. The track was owned by Midland Sports Stadiums (who also owned Leicester Speedway) and Charles Ochiltree promoted the Speedway and Stock Car Racing up until his death in 1998. His son Martin then carried on promoting duties until the stadium was sold to Avtar Sandhu in 2003. The stadium's capacity is approximately 5,000. The record attendance for Brandon was set during a speedway meeting and stands at 25,000.

The shale speedway track, which is inside the dog track is 301 metres (329 yards) in length while the greyhound track is 409 metres (447 yards) in length.

Speedway

Brandon Stadium has been a popular stop for many high profile speedway events in its lifetime. Under the old format of the Speedway World Championship events including the British Speedway Championship, the Commonwealth and Overseas Finals as well as hosting the 1998, 1999 and 2000 Speedway Grand Prix of Great Britain. The 'Brandonapolis' is an annual event at Brandon which features some of the worlds best speedway riders. It was postponed in 2011 due to the BSPA dispute of the 2011 Elite League Season.

In 1991, Brandon Stadium staged the Under-21 World Championship Final which was won by Denmark's Brian Andersen who defeated fellow Dane Morten Andersen in a runoff after both finished on 14 points. Australia's Jason Lyons finished third, while the leading British rider Joe Screen finished in 5th place with 10 points.

The speedway also hosted the last ever Speedway World Team Cup Final in 2000 (won by Sweden) after having previously held the Final in 1993 won by the United States.

Speedway World Finals

World Team Cup

Individual Under-21 World Championship

Speedway Grand Prix

Stock car racing

The speedway track is also used for BriSCA F1 Stock Cars, having raced here continuously since 1954. The first meeting was held on 30 June, the first heat being won by Percy 'Hellcat' Brine, he also won the meeting Final. The BriSCA Formula 1 Stock Cars World Championship has been held here many times since 1960. The track is also used for BriSCA Formula 2 Stock Cars, V8 Hotstox, and various other forms of oval Motorsport including Bangers, Saloon Stock Cars, Ministox and Sprint Cars.

Greyhound racing

Greyhounds Racing at Brandon originally opened on 19 September 1978, fourteen years after the closure of the Lythalls Lane track in north-east Coventry, due to redevelopment as a housing estate. The owners of the Coventry track at the time also owned Brandon Stadium, and always had plans to bring greyhounds there despite the gap. The greyhound operation lasted until 2009 when it was closed. It re-opened in May 2012 with the race meetings taking place on Thursday, Saturday and Sunday until 2014 when the Greyhound Board of Great Britain licensed racing ended. However it remains open to independent racing.[1]

References

  1. ↑ "Coventry (Brandon) Stadium" (PDF). Greyhound Racing History.

External links

Coordinates: 52°23′33″N 1°24′6″W / 52.39250°N 1.40167°W / 52.39250; -1.40167

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